Playing with Forgiveness – Self and Others

Another Playback Theatre workshop is in the bag, and it’s been a thrilling ride. Eight intense hours with six others sharing a myriad of stories. By our conclusion at 5 PM, it was hot, and we were tired. The day had been an intense sequence of stories and playing, and we’d struggled to name the common themes or “red thread” as we in Playback call it. As we began to close, one participant suddenly interrupted, “you know what? I think the ‘red thread’ is about forgiveness.”

I was bracing for a longer explanation, resisting another pull into a vast sea of discussion as I tried to facilitate a tidy ending. But that was it. “Forgiveness.” Hmm. We moved to end. And the more the day sinks in (now 36 hours old), the more it resonates. Sometimes the biggest gifts arrive at the most unexpected moments.

As with most workshops I facilitate, I spend the next day or so in evaluation, self-reflection and self-criticism. This one was no different. Even though i thought i’d wrapped things up emotionally with a spacious evening, the next day continued with somewhat humorous internal chatter of “what if’s” and “aw shucks.” My practice of silent worship with Friends (Quakers) puts a spotlight on this kind of mental jabbering. And so it goes. Or does it? When will i be able to just let it go?

The biggest realization for me, the facilitator is this: i also need to play our forgiveness. Self-forgiveness. The embodied art form that allowed us to develop a common story and process of seeking forgiveness (toward others) is also exactly what i need to enable forgiving myself. In a world surrounded by disembodied media and disembodied social situations (including Friends worship perhaps), embodied arts seem to play an extraordinarily vital role in making forgiveness more than just a mental hoop to jump through.

This is about more than forgiving myself for choices made facilitating a workshop. This is about the biggies: the relationships i broke, the people i hurt, the family i grew up with, the anger i expressed, the jobs i lost, the people i let down, the oppression i supported, the victim i played, the ‘stuff’ i demanded, the debt i went into, the frivolousness i indulged in, the fear i cowered under. This could go on a long time. And i know i’m not alone. Most if not all of us have a decent list of self-forgiveness agenda. Indeed, it’s the only thing that keeps us from forgiving (and fully loving) others. So how do we check things off of it?

More doing, less stewing. That’s the phrase that came to me in Friends Meeting today. We need practices to work through forgiveness. We need to do, to act, to walk the talk. Just like every guide needs a guru and every counselor needs their own therapy, so every facilitator needs a forum where they can be facilitated. Can someone Playback me?

We are only as effective as our integrity – how much we walk our talk throughout our lives. But many of us also live in an very impoverished world when it comes to natural, embodied community. It’s often much easier to play roles – or escape them – than truly act – act out our true needs and our unselfconscious calling. The task remains for us: maximize our real community experience, our embodied existence and our opportunities for honesty. Somewhere in there is a way forward to checking off all the “shoulda woulda coulda’s” of my last workshop – and a whole lot more.

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Welcome

Improviser, advocate, conversation starter, I have a passion for bringing together authentic community. This site is just a distant echo of my work in the world. But perhaps you’ll resonate. In addition to occasional blog reflections, you’ll find here:

1. Tools for facilitating community with storytelling and improvisational theatre that can bridge the widest chasms between people.

2. Samples of websites I’ve built for artists and small businesses to run their own sites at minimal cost, generally with WordPress.

3. Original research on the myths of ethnic conflict in the Former Yugoslavia, my M.A. thesis.

I welcome your feedback. Drop me a line via the contact page or tweet @jubileearts.